


The Theory of You

by soclose



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, F/F, Lena Luthor-centric, Panic Attacks, Psychic Abilities, Slow Burn, and pluck out the bits i like, this is basically some canon au magic where i just sort of do the /hand wavy thing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-05
Updated: 2018-11-28
Packaged: 2019-06-05 12:50:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15171125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soclose/pseuds/soclose
Summary: During the process of cataloging Lex's vaults, Lena has an unfortunate run-in with a space brain. She wakes up in the hospital with the ability to hear the thoughts of those around her.Canon(ish) post-s3 au.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from the Nikita Gill work, The Theory of You.
> 
> This story takes place sometime vaguely after season 3. For the purposes of this fic, James/Lena didn't happen. Mon-el left with Imra. Basically I just do what I want.
> 
> Comments and kudos make me write faster. :)
> 
> This fic was beta'd by Tumblr's lovely idontneedtobeforgiven and sunspill. 
> 
> I'm hopeful for biweekly updates.
> 
> Come say hi at wakefulstarss. :)

After the vault she found hidden half a mile under a burnt out oil refinery in North Dakota, Lena thought she would stop being surprised by Lex’s paranoia and wild distribution of his assets.

She was wrong.

It wasn’t that she had lied to the DEO, not exactly. Lex did keep a vault in the lab. He just _also_ kept one in a mountain range outside National City, one in the sub basement of an L-Corp subsidiary in Japan, and now--apparently--one stashed behind the walk-in cooler of a New York deli…

Her research suggested at least a dozen more secret labs located across the globe, but Lena was doing her best to work from most concerning to least. As she’d told Supergirl, she’d inherited Lex’s assets, for good or for ill, and it was about time she had an accurate inventory of exactly what those assets entalled.

Like the various alien plague virus samples Lena’s assistants were currently boxing into a vacuum-sealed shipping container for transport back to National City.

 _Got an interesting one for you today, ETA 1600_ , Lena types, shooting off a text to Winn. Whether she likes it or not, some of Lex’s ‘assets’ have required DEO collaboration to deal with safely. Lena doesn’t fancy her lab being ground zero for a Llaran pox outbreak when she tries to incinerate the virus cultures.

So collaboration it is.

[Winn Schott]: Yesssss u bring the best gifts  
[Winn Schott]: Should i rally the team?

[Lena Luthor]: No, that shouldn’t be necessary.  
[Lena Luthor]: You and I should be able to handle this one, with the right resources.

[Winn Schott]: Righty oh, science partner :)

The telltale _hiss_ of the L-Corp security box hermetically sealing itself sifts itself over Lena’s eardrums. She tucks her phone into the safety of her bag and watches as the container is carefully lifted into the back of the truck.

“Just the big one left, Miss Luthor,” her assistant tells her, nodding as he passes on his way back into the vault while his colleague straps in their other assets for transport.

“Thanks, Ryan,” she returns, thumb pushing up the plastic bridge of her safety glasses up her nose. She reaches for her tablet, balancing it on the palm of her hand as she brings up Lex’s inventory list and the corresponding files she has (or hasn’t) been able to track down.

“‘Inventory location NR31,’” she reads as her second assistant steps into the vault behind the first. “‘Space brain of unknown origin.’”

Her eyebrow raises. Space brain? She pictures the formalin-preserved specimens of her education; did Lex acquire an alien brain for the purposes of anatomical study?

 ( _How did he ‘acquire’ it in the first place?_ she can’t help but wonder….)

 “Let’s take this one as a team move, please, gentleman,” she calls into the vault, receiving a pair of affirmative acknowledgements back in return.

 With their lab coats buttoned high and thick rubber gloves pulled up to their elbows, the men return wheeling a cart, a thick black plastic casing over the top with Lex’s signature labelling system neatly printed on the top.

 _Non-carbon based organic specimen. Light sensitive. Living, as of…_ Lena references the open chart on her tablet… _2008??_

“Eric, switch us over to red light only, please,” she says, brows furrowed as she pulls down the tablet menu to filter her device’s own blue LED light.

With the faint click of the switch, the room is plunged into relative darkness. Nothing but the soft orange glow of her tablet illuminates the small room before a lamp is switched on, the red bulb coating the room in its dim light.

Eric holds the singular bulb aloft as Ryan readies to lift away the dark plastic shield from the supposed brain. With slow, steady movements, the case is removed and Lena’s eyes scour the specimen, heart hammering in her chest as lays first eyes on the pulsing tissue.

For all its size, Lena’s first observation is that the brain is incredibly _human_ -looking. Suspended in a glass orb, it bobs gently a solid four inches from each edge of the glass, and the sheer _absurdity_ of it -- no stasis fluid, no discernible method of preservation or system to maintain life -- has Lena’s finger trembling as she taps to initiate video recording on her tablet and begins to circle the bench.

“The specimen appears humanoid on first glance,” she says, taking slow, measured steps around the bench. “Deep sulci and gyri with a greyish cast seem to mimic the human cerebral cortex.”

Her eyebrows furrow as she continues walking, stepping closer to the glass to get a clearer image in the dark, filtered light.

“Where the human brain contains two obvious hemisphere, NR31 seems to contain four,” Lena says. “It appears a near-perfect sphere…. No obvious brain stem or connection into a larger central nervous system is apparent on visual inspection.”

Lena snaps a few still photographs while her own mind goes into overdrive.

Lena has always been a physicist, an engineer first and foremost, but being raised a Luthor meant studying the biological sciences, as well. And for all her exposure to medicine and biochemistry and aliens and alien hatred…. Lena finds herself wholly unprepared to comprehend a life form that maintains higher cognitive function without the aid of a central nervous system.

Superman, Supergirl, the Daxamites…. They’re human, on the surface. Lena has seen some of Supergirl’s fights with _little green men_ broadcast across National City’s evening news, but even when their skins were grey or they projectile vomited an acid goo, the beings were recognizable as lifeforms. They had a head to house their brains, two (or more) structures to house eyes for sensing the environment. They moved with limbs and all of their body parts were attached to one form. 

 _This_ , however….

This brain suggested a life form with no central nervous system. Had Lex acquired the brain from a lifeforms that housed its brain suspended within its own skull, much like it floated in the glass? Was the brain the entirety of the being itself?

Was even Lena’s considerable intellect too lacking in creativity imagine such a being at all?

 _Oh, Lex,_ she thinks, a familiar weight settling heavy in the space around her heart. _What marvels could you have shown the world if you hadn’t succumbed to the path of madness?_

She’s broken from her thoughts by a flicker in the glass, a glint in the shine of it. Lena’s head swirls to find the unchecked source of light, mouth halfway around the order for Ryan to put the case back on the specimen, _now_ , but no….

The flicker flashes again, catches her eye like a blip of static under the covers at night.

Is that…?

Lena bends in to look closer, tablet held lamely in her hand as her eyes squint to trace the path of a faint blue grow as it jitters across the smooth, wavy surface.

“Miss Luthor?” she hears, but the words feel distant, important in the face of _this_. A second flash joins the first one, a green spark that titters in the direction of the first blip, almost reaching out….

“Miss Luthor, I think maybe you should step away from that….”

“Quiet, Eric.”

The green spark is born again, its filament-like reach nearly touching the blue this time. Lena watches, almost rooting for it as a third attempt is made….

The two sparks meet, Lena’s face bathed in a flash of purple colliding light before the world spins on its axis before everything goes dark.

Lena falls.

\--------------------

Her forehead crumples as she blinks under the harsh overhead lighting. There’s an ache that starts right between her eyebrows and wraps around to press vice-like at the soft spots of her temples.

“Miss Luthor? Lena, can you hear me?”

Throat rumbling, Lena makes a noise somewhere between a question and assent, squeezing her eyes shut under the assaulting lights.

“Bright…” she mutters turning her head to the side and groaning with the wave of nausea that rolls over here.

“Just a second, sweetheart, let me turn down the lights,” the voice assures her, quieter this time. There’s a gentle shuffling at her side, the squeak of tight wheels rolling on laminate floors before the whir of the overhead light ends and a dimmer, soft light takes its place at the head of her bed.

 _“Ugh, fucking hazelnut,”_ comes another voice, deeper and curled with disgust, as Lena struggles to open her eyes, blinking quick to settle the blur from them.

“There, that should be better,” the first voice says. “I’m Annie, I’m a nurse. You’re at New York Presbyterian Hospital, Miss Luthor. Are you in any pain?”

 _“Will Emma get mad if I pick a blue cast?”_ asks a smaller voice, a child’s, and Lena’s eyes scour the room for the source as her surroundings begin to fill in her vision.

“Um.” Swallowing thick, Lena tries to bat about the cobwebs from her mind, taking in the soft blue of the hospital room, the IV pole, the _beep beep beep_ of the monitoring equipment placed around her. “My head….”

“On a scale from 1 to 10, how would you rate the pain?”

This time Lena can place the voice to the nurse at her side, a woman adjusting the settings on her IV pump machine.

“Maybe a 6?” Lena says, forcing herself to swallow back a mouthful of saliva that pools under her tongue, in her cheeks. Her stomach flips and she tells the nurse, “I’m really very nauseous, though.”

“Alright, I’ve got some zofran for you right here, lets get that in you,” the nurse tells her kindly, reaching for a syringe on the top of her workstation.

_“Bitch.”_

Lena’s head picks up. “Excuse me?!”

“Sorry, dear?” the nurse asks, uncapping the anti-emetic as she moves towards Lena’s bedside.

“You just said….” Lena’s brow furrows, the young woman’s face devoid of anything behind the clinical compassion of a nurse for her patient. “I’m sorry, I thought I heard you say something.

“Might have been someone out in the hall,” Annie says, smiling. “This is a busy ward today.”

“Yeah….”

Annie reaches for her IV line, finding an orange capped port and untwisting the cap before twisting on the syringe. “Here we go, this should get you feeling a little better. I’ve got an order for pain meds I can go grab now that you’re awake, too.”

“Thank you,” Lena says, quiet, shoulders relaxing back into the unforgiving mattress. “Um… Do you know what exactly happened?”

“Seems you managed to get yourself electrocuted at work,” Annie tells her, tossing the empty syringe into the trash can before she puts the port cap back on Lena’s line.

That seems... the most appropriate explanation, Lena supposes, considering the circumstances. “And my employees, Eric and Ryan, are they….?”

“Dismissed a few hours ago,” Annie assures her with a soft smile. “Neither of them seemed to sustain any injuries, but we checked them out just in case. I believe a young woman just arrived a little while ago to see you. Jessica? Should I call down to the waiting room to tell her you’re awake?”

“Jess,” Lena says, looking up at her. How long was she unconscious??? “Yes, please. I’d like to see her.”

“Sure thing,” she agrees. “I’ll let her know and come back in a few minutes with your pain medicine, okay?”

“Thank you.”

The nurse gathers the last of her things before seeing herself out with a quiet click of the door behind her. As soon as she’s alone, Lena lets out a breath, her monitor ticking up as her heart rate picks up and she presses the heels of her palms into the hollows of her eye sockets.

What the hell happened to her in that vault?

Flickers of blue and green and a bright pulse of light skip across her mind’s eye, and hours later (hours, yes... Exactly how many had she lost to this?) she can question her own draw to the brain with more rational hindsight.

She shouldn’t have been so intrigued, should she? While interesting, certainly, a brain was hardly the most exotic or concerning one of the Lex’s possessions. But that light…. She’d seen it and she’d _had_ to see more ---.

_“God, does everything take three hours around here or what?”_

Lena flinches as she hears the voice, masculine and unfamiliar, close enough to be standing right beside her. But her eyes scan the room, wild, and she finds herself decidedly alone.

“Hello…?” she calls cautious, quiet, her cheeks burning with the sheer absurdity of calling out to an empty room.

_“Amazing how many people are allergic to everything but opiates these days.”_

_“I’m so hungry.”_

_“Jesus, Steve. Shut up for five minutes and let the doctor talk.”_

_“It’s serious this time. I know it is. I can tell what they’re not telling me.”_

Heartbeat thumping in her chest, Lena brings her fingers to her temples, rubs at the tense muscles.

 _No one is here_ , she reminds herself. She’s alone in her room. Therefore, logic dictates that the voices _must_ be coming from the outside hall.

_“I hate needles, hate needles, hate needles! Owwwwww!”_

So why the hell do they sound so _close_???

“----Miss Luthor?”

The familiar tone of Jess cutting through the chaos, Lena’s eyes snap up to meet worried ones, and her breath rushes out with the relief of _seeing_ a source of the voice she can so clearly hear.

“Jess,” she says, blinking quick. “Thank God. Please, come in.”

“How are you feeling?” Jess asks, concerned as she slips into the room. “I tried to get here sooner, but with the jet already in New York, I had to book a commercial flight, and you know those take forever….”

“It’s alright,” Lena assures her. “Please, sit. I have to say, I just woke up and everything’s a bit… _much_ , right now.”

With her eyebrows furrowed, Jess nods at her in sympathy, taking the offered seat and pulling an L-Corp tablet from her bag.

“The doctors gave me your belongings; your phone was fried,” she says, powering up the tablet before handing it over to Lena. “I called headquarters to transfer your backup to a new one. It should be waiting for you when we get back.”

“Thank you,” Lena says softly. “I assume my tablet was lost, as well?”

Jess nods, apology woven in the scrunch of her nose. “I spoke to Eric and Ryan before they left. They’re gonna send me their depositions in the morning. We contacted the NYPD and the backup team should be securing the rest of the vault now. They told me about the… brain.”

Lena sighs, fingertip resting on the home button to unlock the tablet. She winces at the pain that twinges at the back of her eyes as the screen opens, and immediately moves to turn the brightness down, down, down….

_“What kind of brain shoots electricity at people anyway?”_

“Lex’s file just said ‘space brain,’” Lena answers, eyes squinting at the offensive contrast of the LED screen as she pulls up her remote phone application. “I don’t know what the hell actually happened; I hope some of the equipment was far enough away to get a clean read without interference.”

“I’ll have the team take a look ASAP,” Jess says, finger sliding across her own phone screen as she makes the note.

Lena sighs, the breath working from the bottom of her lungs to clear her of its weight.

Winn Schott, 7 missed texts, 3 missed calls, 2 voicemails.  
Alex Danvers, 2 missed texts, 2 missed calls, 1 voicemail.  
Kara Danvers, 24 missed texts, 6 missed calls, 6 voicemails.

Her eyes flick to the top of the screen and the small black bar that displays 1:23 AM in white block letters.

“What??” Lena pulls down the menu bar, blinking to make sure her eyes aren’t deceiving her.

“Miss Luthor?”

“It’s one in the morning?!” she says, half statement half question, and Jess’ brows pinch in the middle.

“They said you were unconscious for quite some time,” she says, and Lena recognizes the tone, the same way it levels to tell her an unfortunate business associate is awaiting her arrival. “Apparently you were brought in just before noon.”

Lena tears her eyes away, to the curtained window that hides any view of the outside world from her room. Between the ache in her head and dizziness upon her waking…. “I guess I hadn’t realized.”

“I’m sure you’ll get your bearings back soon,” Jess says softly. _“I hope so. L-Corp would be nothing without her.”_

Lena lets out a scrape of a chuckle at that, turning to her assistant with confusion in the lift of her brow. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I’m sure there are plenty of people who would violently disagree with you.”

“The doctors said you’re expected to make a full recovery,” Jess returns.

“I meant they would disagree with you about L-Corp,” Lena says, pulling up her email app to scan through the senders and titles.

“I didn’t say anything about L-Corp.”

This time it’s Lena’s brow that furrows. “Yes, you did. You just said ‘L-Corp would be nothing without her.’”

Jess furrows her brows. “No, I didn’t.”

“Yes, you did,” Lena repeats, looking at her assistant. “I heard you.”

Jess shakes her head. “No, Miss Luthor. I didn’t say that. _But I did sort of think it?"_  

“What do you mean you ‘ _sort of_ ’ thought it?” Lena asks, her voice more demanding than she intends it to be. “You said it, Jess, I heard you.”

“ _C_ _an you still hear me?_ ”

“Of course, I can!” Lena replied, huffing out a breath. Her heart rate monitor was beginning to tick up and her headache was increasing until her temples began to throb. “I’m concussed, not deaf.”

“Miss Luthor.” It’s Jessica’s gentle tone that calls Lena’s gaze back toward her. “ _I’m not saying anything_.”

Lena blinks, squeezing her eyes shut when it looks like Jess’ mouth doesn’t move at all. “What---? I don’t---?”

“ _I’m thinking it._ ”

The metered beep of the monitor at her bedside ticks up again, sets off an alarm, and it’s enough to jolt Lena from her frozen position, head dizzy and the room spinning as Annie comes back in and presses a few buttons to silence that.

“Well, just what is going on in here to get you all worked up?” Annie asks, looking between the two women.

“I’m sorry, I’m afraid I got talking too much about work too soon,” Jess apologies smoothly. “I promise that’s it for the work talk tonight.”

Annie’s expression softens, smiling at Lena when she nods, swallows thick.

“Well,” she says, pulling a syringe and a small IV bag out of her scrubs. “Let’s see that you do, and see if these pain meds help you get some rest, hmm, Miss Luthor?”

“Thank you,” she says quietly, offering out her hand with the IV for the nurse to uncap a port and attach the small bag.

“This one’s your dilaudid, to help with the pain,” she says, hanging the bag and twisting a few nozzles to get the clear liquid flowing. “This second one here is phenergan. The dilaudid can make you pretty nauseous, and we don't want to give you too much zofran.”

Lena watches as she slowly presses down the syringe plunger and injects the medicine into Lena’s waiting veins.

“Thank you,” Lena says, feeling the first rush of medicine start to weigh down her limbs.

“Of course,” Annie tells her, twisting the orange port cap back into place on her wrist. “Now you try to get some rest, and I’ll be back in a few hours, alright? Hit your call button if you need anything in the meantime. _I really need to pee._ ”

“...I will. Thank you.”

“Get some rest, dear.”

The air in the room is thick between them in her nurse’s absence, but the warmth of the medicine helps to quiet the shroud of voices filling her head. Instead, she’s filled with a cottony kind of fuzziness, a weight on her eyelids that makes sleep seem to easy, so simple….

“Jess?” she says, tongue numb and lazy as she grapples with her hold on her own consciousness.

“Yes, Miss Luthor?” comes the dutiful reply.

“Please call…” Her weight sinks into the mattress beneath her. “Please call Dr. Reichardt. Tell him…. I need to see him as soon as I’m back in National City.”

“I will, Miss Luthor.”

Her eyelids droop, blur the room around her as she blinks. “Thanks. I'm glad... 'm glad you’re here.”

She forces her eyelids to open when she hears the scuff of a chair at the side of her bed. “Everything’s going to be okay, Miss Luthor. Just rest now. _You’re not alone._ ”

\--------------------

They don’t speak about yesterday’s revelations in the morning. The daytime charge nurse, a tall man named Derek, comes in to relieve Annie before breakfast and inform Lena that she’s being discharged.

Despite the throbbing ache in her head and the constant stream of voices that she just _can’t shut off_ , she’s sent on her way with a bottle of percocet and instructions to see her doctor back home as soon as she’s able to get in.

Jess leads them out of the hospital through the medical school rather than patient discharge, avoiding the crowds of patients and visitors.

Lena slips from the wheelchair into the waiting town car, trying to ignore the constant stream of Jessica’s thoughts as she hears the same few on repeat: “ _I’ve got to talk to her about this. I don’t know if Dr. Reichardt will know what to do. Maybe Miss Danvers? The agent one, I know she’s upset with Kara. Oh no, can she hear me right now???”_

Lena really owes this poor woman a raise.

“Jess,” she says softly as her assistant slides in beside her, a bright pink bag reading _Patient Belongings_ held on her lap. “It’s okay. We’ll talk on the plane.”

Her nod pulls some of the tension from Jess’ shoulders, but doesn’t calm her thoughts on the drive to the airport. Lena, for her part, rests her temple against the cool glass of the window, closes her eyes and tries to use every expensive therapy technique she’s ever learned to calm her mind and focus on her breath.

_In - one, two, three…. Out - one, two three…._

They turn down Broadway and the street crowds begin to thicken, the thoughts spilling over the general noise and bustle of upper Manhattan to scream like a roaring concert crowd in Lena’s ears.

Her fists clench in her lap, knuckles white where the skin pulls across her bones. She counts the seconds as they wait at a stop light, begging them to pass. 

“Could you put on the radio, please?” she asks the driver, leaning forward to catch his attention. As the man nods and reaches for the nobs, Lena adds, “something classical, if you’ve got it.”

The flickering sounds of a radio being tuned scratch against her ears, but soon enough, the vibrato of violins and the twinkle of a piano come through the speaker. Resting her head against the headrest, Lena tries to drown herself in the sound of it. She focuses on the chords, the way the percussion syncopates with the bass line and the the soft flutter of a trilling flute sounding out over the rest of the orchestra.

“Miss Luthor, is there anything I can do?” Jess asks quietly at the same time Lena hears, _“oh, I wish I could help her_.”

It takes a moment for Lena to parse the two sentences apart amidst the chaos, and another for her to bring herself to shake her head.

“I’m just looking forward to getting home and getting some answers,” she says, offering what she hopes is a reassuring smile. 

If the nervous smile Jess offers back is any indication, it’s not reassuring at all.

She’s nauseous with overstimulation and the start of a migraine by the time they reach LaGuardia, and despite her stubborn insistence that she’s _fine_ , she doesn’t need anymore painkillers, she finds herself digging to the bottom of her bag halfway through pre-check for one of the round white tabs of Percocet to take the edge off her throbbing headache.

There has to be a solution to this. There has to be a fix.

Within twenty minutes of having their bags scanned, Jess and Lena board one of the L-Corp private jets, welcomed by their pilot for the flight, Thomas, and the attendant, Margaret.

“Would you like anything to drink before we take off, Miss Luthor?” Margaret asks as Lena settles her bags and takes her seat in one of the large leather flight chairs.

“I'd love a water, thank you,” she says with a small smile, despite her desire for a heavy glass of wine. What she would give to drown herself in a couple glasses of Merlot, recline her seat back once they hit altitude and sleep her way through the next six hours of fly time.... But alcohol and concussions do not mix, nor do opiates, and as much as she might welcome the _quiet_ , she’s not willing to risk the seizures.

Not yet anyway.

With a cold bottle of water at her side and a cup of coffee for Jess, they settle in for takeoff. As the plane roars to life under them and the wheels lift from the ground, Lena lets out a breath.

There’s only four of them on this plane. Four people whose thoughts can slip over into hers, and the comparable _silence_ of it has Lena’s shoulders slumping in relief. The pilot and his copilot are reviewing the flight status, their conversation and thoughts barely whispers over the roar of the engines. Jess’ thoughts are much louder, closer, but with just the two of them, it’s more conversation than screaming.

_"Is it okay to ask or should I just…? I’ll let her take the lead….”_

Lena turns to her assistant with a tug of her lips. “It’s okay, you can ask.”

“So it’s true?” Jess asks, eyes wide. “You can… You can hear my thoughts?”

“Everyone’s apparently,” she says, propping an elbow on her armrest and rubbing her fingers into the soft indent at her temple. “The ride to the airport was awful.” 

“I could tell you were upset,” Jess says, voice softened with sympathy. _“I've got to watch my thoughts. Nothing dirty around the boss. Or weird. Oh no, I’m doing it right now!”_

Lena lets out a soft chuckle. “Don’t worry about it. It’s… going to take some getting used to for both of us. I’m hoping once we’re home, I’ll be able to get some answers. See how I can fix this.”

_“What if you can’t?”_

The thought comes quickly, too quickly for Jess to filter and Lena knows the same thought is already swimming in the back of her own head. 

“Maybe… we should contact Alex Danvers?” Jess offers. “Or Mr. Schott? They might be able to help.”

“No, I don’t want to involve them, not yet,” Lena tells her with a wave of her hand. If she tells Alex, she tells Kara. If she tells Winn, she tells…. Probably James, and Alex, who tells Kara, and suddenly, everyone knows. “Let me get a handle of what’s going on and then I’ll seek out resources as I need them.”

“Yes, Miss Luthor.”

It isn’t long before Lena feels her head begin to droop, the effects of the Percocet weighing down her limbs and easing the pain behind her eyes. Reclining her chair enough to prevent a neck ache when she wakes, Lena closes her eyes and lets the white noise of a roaring 737 engine lull her to sleep.

\--------------------

“Miss Luthor, we’re getting ready to start our descent.”

With heavy eyelids and a blurry gaze, Lena blinks herself awake. Lifting herself to return the chair to its upright position, she rubs gently at her eyes, yawning into her palm to ease the sleep from her bones. Jess is beside her packing up her laptop and padfolio, looking over to give Lena a soft smile.

“Did you sleep well?” she asks. _“Those snores were cute.”_  

Lena feels her face heat and drops her gaze, eyes flickering around the cabin before they return to her assistant’s face. “Yes, yes I did. I’m sorry for snoring.”

Confusion contorts between Jessica’s brows before realizing dawns on her cheek. “Oh! I’m sorry. It wasn’t loud or anything, you just seemed really knocked out. It was endearing.”

Her words doing nothing to cool the flush in her cheeks and neck, Lena nods, tries to retain a fraction of her dignity as she says, “well. I do feel much better, so….”

She clears her throat, straightening her blouse and attempting to put some professionalism back between them. “Did you happen to get ahold of Dr. Reichardt?”

“Yes. He’s in San Diego today, but he said he will be back tomorrow and you have an appointment for two o’clock.”

“Thank you.”

“It’s no problem.”

A soft tone rings out to alert them to their final descent, and Margaret takes her place up front to buckle in. Lena watches National City come into view as they land, the square grids and city parks turning from abstract shapes to buildings to people and cars.

The bustle of the city assaults her ears before they even touch down.

_“Jesus Christ it’s hot out here. Only two more hours until I’m off, two more hours….”_

_"God, can anyone ever get out of this airport without a delay?”_

_“Look! A big plane!!!”_

_“Wish I could jack off right now.”_

As the brakes slow their plane to a halt, Lena measures her breath, tries to use the air to open up her lungs in counts of three.

Her heart races. Her head pounds.

It's _so_ _loud_.

Someone trips on their way down the terminal and nearly screams about their _utter embarrassment,_ Lena forced to listen to it from her place out on the runway.

She startles, flinching when Jess’ hand lands on her elbow.

“What?!” she bites, harder than intended.

Jess stares at her with wide eyes and Lena feels her gut fall to her lap. She didn't mean to snap, but her throat is tight, too tight, and her arm prickles where Jess touched her.

She can't breathe --- .

“Miss Luthor…. Are you okay? _She doesn’t look okay…._ ”

“I’m fine, I just….” Lena gasps for a breath and her lungs burn. Her heart clenches in her chest, hand coming up to press at the space between her ribs. “I’m just----.”

She tries to push herself to standing, but the world spins on its axis.

“It’s okay, stay sitting, Miss Luthor,” Jess tells her, hand back on her arm and Lena has to fight herself not to pull it away, not to snarl at her assistant and scream and tell her to just _go back, take the plane back up, make it quiet,_ ** _please_** \-----.

“Should I get a doctor?” Margaret asks and Lena shakes her head. She doesn’t need a doctor, she needs everyone to _stop talking,_ stop _thinking,_ stop _touching her._

“I don’t need a doctor,” she says, swallowing when her lungs burn for air. _Breathe, Lena. You know the symptoms of a panic attack_ …. “Jess, call Alex Danvers. Tell her I…. Tell her I’m coming in.”

“I’m already here,” she hears, a familiar alto standing out from the jumble as the agent boards the plane. “You went out of communication with Winn yesterday; we came to make sure everything was okay.”

Lena nods. “I’m fine.”

Her jaw clenches and her teeth grind as her entire flight crew, assistant, and Alex Danvers stare at her.

_“What the hell happened to her?”_

“Can we have some room, please?” Lena bites out, looking at the others. “I’m _fine_ , and Agent Danvers is a doctor.”

Reluctantly, the flight crew departs, and Lena lifts a hand to halt Jess when her assistant struggles with the decision of whether she should leave, too.

“What’s going on, Lena?” Alex asks, soft as she takes a seat beside her.

Dizzy, Lena feels trapped, her heart pounding for a way out of her chest, out of a body that refuses to be put back into her control.

“We were cataloging one of Lex’s vaults,” she says forcing the words through her too tight throat. “One of the items was a brain, something alien. I guess I got too close, or it touched me, or _something_ , but I woke up ten hours later in the hospital, and now….”

She runs out of breath, out of courage to admit it. Her eyes blur and fill with tears and she hastily swipes at her cheek as one has the audacity to slip past her lash line.

“We should get you to the DEO to be examined,” Alex says, voice soft. “We can go over the details there.”

And as much as Lena wants to protest, doesn’t want the DEO or Supergirl near _any_ of this, she knows, logically, rationally, that she can’t do her own examinations right now.

Not if she can’t hold herself together on the NCX tarmac, for Christ’s sake.

She forces herself to nod before she can lose the nerve.

 _“Maybe I should have Kara fly her there, she doesn’t look so good_.”

Lena blinks. “What?"

“Do you think you handle the car ride?” Alex asks out loud. “Otherwise we can have Supergirl fly you in.”

“But you just said….”

Revelation dawns and every beat of her heart rattles the bones of her rib cage. They pound out a beat that she thinks she should have known all along.

Kara could fly her there…. Supergirl can fly you in, Lena….

Maybe she did know.

Maybe she didn’t want to.

“Kara is Supergirl,” Lena says, tongue numb as it rolls over the words.

Jess’ jaw drops as Alex’s face falls blank.

“What are you talking about?” Alex asks, while her ears fill with the sounds of Jess' triumphant _I knew it!!_

“I touched the brain and now I can read minds,” Lena replies. The words slip past her lips with her mind trailing a few seconds behind. She fights to hold onto the conversation like grains of sand slipping through her hands, but.... “You just said… _Thought_ ….”

It's not a question. The color drains from Alex’s cheeks and Lena doesn’t need alien mind-reading powers to get her confirmation.

“Kara Danvers is Supergirl.”

 _“Shit._ ”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been like forever but we do what we want in this lawless wasteland, so hello again everybody. :)
> 
> This chapter is dedicated to jazzfordshire for being Super cool (see what I did there?).
> 
> I will say upfront this is not the most Supercorp heavy chapter. In fact there's very little supercorp in this chapter. I'm sorry. I originally added another scene of all supercorp at the end but it just like... didn't work, so it's going in ch 3 instead.
> 
> This chapter is a lot of exposition and I'm uncertain about it BUT this is a really complex load of nonsense that I'm writing so entertain me and let me try to explain some of it while establishing character dynamics and emotional states. :)
> 
> It'll be worth the stuff coming in ch 3, I promise. It's got the Kara/Lena Talk About Supergirl so. Hang with me and leave me love, either here or on tumblr @ wakefulstarss. Talking/interacting with me about my work is most definitely the best way to inspire me to write more quickly. 99% of the reason this chapter took so long was because of the season break and I was just mehhhh. As soon as Lena hopped back on my screen, ya girl was back.
> 
> PS season 4 doesn't exist in this fic.
> 
> Love ya.
> 
> EDIT: ALSO I DIDN'T EDIT THIS BECAUSE I'M TRASH AND HAVE HAD MIGRAINES BUT I'LL GO THROUGH IN THE MORNING FOR TYPOS, SORRY LOVE ME ANYWAY

“Miss Luthor, if it’s okay with you,” Director J’onzz began, “I would like your permission to attempt to read your mind. Perhaps I might be able to ascertain what change has taken place as a result of this... space brain.”

Secluded deep in the DEO’s sub-basement, Lena is able to get a grasp back on her own thoughts. With only a handful of people around, she’s able to filter out the voices and focus her own, to keep her heartbeat at a moderate staccato instead of the thundering gallop of the airport.

Distantly, she’s aware that she should be concerned with this man’s abilities. The director of the world’s most clandestine agency is not only an alien, but one with the ability to read minds? Why did they bother to question her about Sam at all?

 _Not the time_ , she tells herself. Lena’s already halfway to packing her own Pandora’s Box with today’s revelations, and Director J’onzz is waiting for an answer.

She nods slowly.

She watches the director’s eyes close. Her head is draped in the warm sensation of a wet cloth, a gentle thing before lightning strikes between her eyes. A scream rips the air from her lungs, her skin scalding as she lurches back in her chair to attempt to get away from it.

“Lena!!!”

“What the hell??”

Hands clamped at her head, Lena works at her jaw, dropping the hinges as if to pop her ears.

“What just happened?!” Alex demands, staring between the two of them when Lena dares to open her eyes.

“Some sort of psychic feedback,” the director answers, rubbing his own temple. “Like placing a microphone too close to the speaker.”

“The Larsen effect,” she says weakly, at the same time Winn triumphantly declares it.

Alex shoots him a glare and Supergirl (--- _Karal_ , her mind corrects, _you can’t un-know this, Lena..._ ) looks between them with that telltale crinkle between her brows.

Winn’s mind becomes the loudest voice in the room, distracting her. Spiraling off, he shuffles through theories of positive feedback loops and why two Martians can mind meld (---- _mind meld??_ ), but a Martian and a space brain-affected Luthor cannot. He supposes it must have something to do with the dissonant waves of psychic ener -- .

“---Winn, _please,_ ” she says, rubbing her temples.

“Oh, sorry!” he says, frowning apologetic. His mind calms for a second, _alright, Winslow, nice and steady, you got this,_ before it starts up again. _But really, if she can hear things like a stream of consciousness, maybe it’s just a matter of psychic ‘sound waves---.’_

Her eyes close, breathing out a sigh as he throws his hands up in the air.

“I’m _sorry_!” he cries out. “This is tough! It’s like someone tells you not to think of a pink elephant and then all you can think of is a --.”

“--Pink elephant, I know,” she says, turning her attention back to the room and trying not to let her own mind get caught up in the tangled whirlwind of Winn’s continued theories.

“Well, now we know that you can’t be read by a Martian,” Director J’onzz says, reclaiming command of the room with the stern baritone of his voice. “Are you able to read anything from Supergirl, Miss Luthor? Kryptonians are immune to most telepaths.”

Her eyes flick to the woman in question. She steels herself with a clenched jaw, ready for psychic feedback or another blow to the heart, she isn’t sure which.

For years, the cool detachment of _Lena Luthor_ has fit like a custom mantle, a cloak ready to rest upon her shoulders at a moment’s notice. Yet now, when faced with such a familiar gaze, clad in fire engine red and primary blue, the weight of it seems to rest too heavy on her shoulders.

But even when she meets the soft of those sweet baby blue eyes, nothing seems to scream at her from behind them. No begging apology nor scathing condemnation. There’s no sneering _of course I didn’t tell you; who would trust a Luthor?_ behind that iconic seal.

For a moment, she looks into the eyes someone she’s called friend, _favorite_ , and the rest of the room is quiet.

She blinks, forcing her gaze to drop when the moment hangs too long and Winn’s shoe scuffs loudly on the cement floor.

“Sorry, um… no, nothing,” she says, swallowing thick. “I can’t hear anything from Supergirl.”

 _Kara. Kara, Kara, Kara, I can’t hear anything from my best friend,_ Kara _\----._

“Well,” Director J’onzz says, motioning to Alex, who brings forth a steel case to set on the table. “That at least confirms that we’re dealing with some sort of telepathic ability. These were designed to dampen Martian psychic powers. With your permission, I’d like to see if they work on you.”

Pressing her thumb to the biolock on the case, Alex opens it to reveal a pair of thick silver bands. Nestled in black foam, the wristlets stare back at her, an LED screen present on the front of each clasp.

Lena’s jaw clenches. He told her, already, that they were _more,_ some sort of psychic dampener, but all she can see is shackles.

All she can see is Lex led into the courtroom in chains. Her mother, head held high while she had Metallo destroy a courtroom, in chains. And now…

“It’s not what you think, Lena.”

“And here I thought _I_ was the one with the mind reading powers, Supergirl,” she quips back, tongue too dry in a mouth that tastes of iron and ash.

“They’re not handcuffs,” Kara insists. “They’re psychic dampeners, so hopefully you don’t get overwhelmed anymore, like you did at the airport.”

Lena turns to face her then, feet planted in the low set of her heels. Her arms cross against her chest, hands clasping each bicep as she stares down the Super.

“No?” she asks, brow raised. “They’re not designed to weaken me, a now-metapowered Luthor, who can read the minds of half the people in the room? Both of whom carry extensive knowledge of classified missions and government operations? I mean, at least Alex has _some_ control over her mind, but Winn? All I’d have to do is mention the mainframe access codes and I’d have them.”

“Hey!” she hears him call out, indignant, at the same time as she hears the numbers mix in with the frantic pace of _fuck, don’t -- one, six, four, nine -- damn it, no, think about, uh… pandas! Six, five two…. FUCK!_

Alex tilts her head as the Director stares her down and Lena meets both of their eyes in turn.

“One, six, four, nine, six, five two,” she says, calm, while Winn groans and flails in her peripheral vision. She can hear Alex swear, just starting to discern the changes that notate her internal voice when she switches to reviewing protocols and considering who she’ll have to contact to have those codes changed from the top down as soon as the Lena situation is dealt with.

“Saying I need to be ‘dealt with’ is really not bolstering my confidence in this situation, Agent Danvers,” she drawls, forcing her eyes to meet the agent’s.

No matter the air she exudes, Lena does not have the upper hand here. She’s several floors deep in the belly of the DEO, with Supergirl herself not six feet from her. If they want those cuffs on her, or any cuffs really, Lena would have no say in the matter. She would end up a prisoner under some classified executive order that applies only to aliens and metahumans.

Hell, for all she knows, they could plant a body-double by morning. _Lena Luthor dies of alcohol poisoning in her own bathtub_ wouldn’t even be that far of a stretch some nights, and she’s seen more than enough to know that the people in this room could pull it off without any outside help.

She just hopes, really hopes, that maybe her friendship with Kara Danvers wasn’t all a lie to keep an eye on the last Luthor, after all.

“Lena, I know you have no reason to trust me right now,” Kara says, breaking the tense silence as she approaches her. “But we just want to help. I know what it’s like to wake up someplace where the whole world seems too loud.”

 

Lena's jaw trembles until she clenches her teeth, biting down hard enough to stall even the slightest chance of movement.

“We are _not_ having this conversation right now,” she says, voice low, gaze piercing as she weighs her words with intention.

Not here. Not now.

Not with Alex and Winn and the Director of the DEO as witness to the tornado inside Lena’s chest.

“You don’t have to wear it,” Alex says, stepping in front of Supergirl with one of the wristbands held loosely in her hand. “These aren’t meant to be shackles. They’re up to you put on and take off. Winn can design you something specific to your powers as soon as we have more information on exactly what they are.”

She offers Lena half a grin, one corner of her lip quirked up as she looks down at the cuff. “Besides, I don’t think these are going to pair well with Armani.”

The comment pulls a huff of a laugh from Lena’s lungs. “Well,” she says dryly, picking up the cuff and feeling the weight of it in her hand. “You’re not wrong about that.”

“I can get started as soon as we run some scans,” Winn assures her. “I’m sure it’s just a matter of a different frequency of brainwaves or psychic energy.”

“I know,” Lena tells him, eyes still scouring over the wristband. “I’ve heard your theories since the moment we walked in the door. They seem sound. Not that I have a large working background in psychic sciences.”

“I think it would be best if we worked with you on this as equals, Miss Luthor,” Director J’onzz says. “We can bring you on as a contractor and give you access to relevant DEO resources to work with Mr. Schott on creating a better device for yourself. We also need to find out if the abilities are permanent, or if any other changes have happened to your physiology.”

“But you have to trust us.”

It comes from Alex this time, Kara still watching in silence, brow crinkled. Lena looks between the three of them, tries to filter out the sounds of Winn's and Alex’s thoughts before she opens the cuff, wraps it gently around her left wrist.

The voices drop to whispers. Lena lets out a breath that she didn’t know she was holding, her chest collapsing with the relief of it, shoulders curling in as her spine bows and her eyelids fall gently closed.

“Any changes?” Alex asks, her spoken voice loud against the relative quiet returned to her head.

“Yes, I, um…” she stutters, blinking as her focus shifts back to the others in the room. Straightening her spine, she composes herself once more, turning to Agent Danvers before she says, “Everything’s quieter. I can still hear you and Mr. Schott, but it’s more like… whispers. I have to focus on it.”

“That’s good, it’s a start,” Alex tells her with a nod and a small smile, meant to be reassuring. Lena doesn’t mean to (---not _really._  But she’s a scientist, she’s infinitely curious by nature, and now that the world isn’t screaming at her, it’s easier to listen in as an active participant--) but she finds herself searching for the undercurrent, the slip of _what else can she do, if these could stop M’yrnn but only dampen her?_

Filing away  _that_ particular information for later evaluation, Lena returns the nod, shifting her attention to Winn when he claps his hands, the noise startling in the now relative quiet of the room.

“And I’ll get to work modifying these babies,” he tells her, his big goofy grin plastered on his face. “Got any preference? Bangle, ear cuff? Wanna cash in on the return of the choker fad?”

“A bracelet will do just fine, thank you,” she says, nodding at him. “Perhaps something more… delicate and discreet.”

The last thing she needs is to be caught by the paparazzi, stuck on TMZ or National City News with the modern-looking equivalent of a house arrest anklet strapped to her wrist. She’s certain the press will have already gotten wind of _Lena Luthor and two L-Corp employees checked into New York Presbyterian emergency department,_ which will require her to spend at least the next week assuring the press and various investors that _no,_ she isn’t going evil or involved in anything illegal, and _no,_  she’s not doing drugs and harboring a secret addiction, either.

She holds in a sigh, feeling the tension creep up the back of her neck and settle into her temples. There’s not many days anymore where she wishes for a magical reset button, but today is just ----.

“I know you’re probably exhausted,” Alex says, interrupting her thought, “but I’d like to get a proper scan on you before we take you home. If there’s anything else unusual as a result of the contact, it probably wasn’t picked up on the hospital’s CT.”

Lena can only nod, swallowing down the bitter taste of adrenaline that surges up her spine. What else could have happened? Quite possibly anything, considering the unknown nature of the specimen, and her brain, her intellect, her one unquestionably strong asset is now at risk.

Even if she doesn’t _want_ to know, she has to.

She has to….

“Alright. Will you be doing the scan, or a DEO physician?”

“I’ll be doing it,” Alex assures her. “None of the results will be shared outside the people in this room without your consent. We’ll head up to medical and I’ll clear one of the bays.”

“I also wanted to discuss the matter of your employees, Miss Luthor,” says Director J’onzz. When Lena raises an eyebrow, he continues, “In addition to being able to read minds, I am able to wipe them. The information surrounding your new abilities is highly sensitive, and at least three of your direct employees plus the airline staff have been privy to a great deal of it. Not to mention your assistant overhearing Supergirl’s identity.”

“What are you saying, Director?”

“Normally we wouldn’t consult you at all, but given our ongoing relationship with L-Corp, I thought it wise to consult you before wiping your employees minds of today’s events.”

Lena’s spine straightens in her chair, turning to steels. “Absolutely not.”

“Miss Luthor, it is not only Supergirl who could be harmed by this information being leaked, but we’re concerned for _your_ safety, as well.”

“Unlike Lex, I haven’t inspired loyalty in my employees through sheer terror,” Lena bites back. “I’ve spent the last two years vetting them and learning who they are. They have families. They have ties to the corporation that don’t involve murder and genocide. I chose Eric and Ryan to help me inventory Lex’s vaults because I trust them with my life. Jess is my assistant; she’s with me every day, I’d never be able to hide this from her, nor do I want to. If you alter one thought in their heads, I will bring the very formidable legal team of L-Corp down on this agency without remorse.”

There’s a moment -- maybe two, three seconds -- where even the minds around her are quiet, and it’s the first space since she woke up in the hospital in which Lena is able to truly, deeply draw in a full breath.

She’s brought boardrooms to their knees with this kind of quiet, with the moment of contemplation that reminds people she is a force to be reckoned with, and when she opens her eyes, she holds the gaze of the Director until he nods, acquiescing to her demands.

“As you wish,” he says, breaking the collective ice of the room. “We’ll deal with NDAs and legal paperwork tomorrow. For now, I’ll leave you with Agent Danvers.”

Lena nods, blinking, mentally ticking off the moment as a win while the Director and Winn depart, the latter still mentally toying with design ideas and wavelength theories.

“Please do not take any ideas from the Apple watch,” she calls out, interrupting one thought with half a shiver. “We had better tech a decade ago.”

“It was just a passing thought, that’s cheating!” Winn calls back before the director ushers him out with a chuckle and the heavy door closes behind them.

“Hey, Lena?” Supergi-- _Kara_ says, her voice soft as though the strength of her name doesn’t shine through in her costume no matter how tightly her eyebrow crinkles. “Um… maybe we could talk later? Say… tomorrow? After you get some rest?”

With her heart rate climbing inside her veins, Lena smothers the urge to dismiss her, to bite out a _no_ so crisp even the walls couldn’t misunderstand her.

“Right now, my priority is ensuring that I’m not going to lose my mind, Supergirl,” she says instead, voice cold as the silver steel of the chair she rises from. “You’ll have to forgive me if interpersonal concerns aren’t at the top of my list at the moment.”

“Of course, sorry,” Kara says, quiet, and Lena can feel the echo of the tension deflating in her bones as Supergirl’s superstance softens and shifts as Kara rubs at the space between her eyebrows, pained. Lena’s own breath shudders in her lungs with the gut-punched ache of it, her chest feeling hollow, lost without the anchor that is _Kara_ , but….

She didn’t lie.

She needs _her mind_.

(What would Lena Luthor have left if she lost it? The black sleep of a genocidal family who never wanted her. A best friend who’s spent two years lying, spying even. What good does Lena Luthor contribute to the world if not for her intellect, her genius?

\-----No. She has to be alright.)

She turns her attention to Alex. “Where to, Agent?”

Alex looks between Lena and Kara once. “Follow me. Hopefully with the dampener, medical will be tolerable; if it’s not let me know.”

Lena nods and moves after her, slipping past Supergirl to make her way back down the long corridor to the same elevators that took them down the first time.

Even if the medical bay threatens to make her ears bleed, Lena has no intention of saying a word. Yet still, she finds herself holding her breath as the elevator rises through the floors, past the few sub basements and the regular ones, back to the mainfloors where they’re deposited into a hallway with several other agents making their way to and from various offices.

_“I could use a nap right now. Or six more cups of coffee."_

_“History has it’s eyesss on youuuuu!”_

_“If Carl doesn’t finish his damn report---”_

Lena lets out a breath, eyes finding Alex’s watching her as they stand outside the elevator lobby.

“You alright? _She seems better than the airport….”_

She nods. “Yes.”

At the skeptical brow raised in her direction, Lena adds, “It’s… _there_ , but I can handle it. I’m fine. Please, lead the way, Agent Danvers.”

Within minutes, Alex had one of the medical bays cleared. Lena changes into DEO issued sweatpants and a tee shirt before she’s directed to the hospital bed, Alex prepping wires and sensors and entering information into the nearby console.

“This is going to tell us a little more than you learned from Sam, right?” she asks, trying to keep the tremor from her voice as Alex presses a sticky metallic disc to each temple.

“Sam didn’t come to the DEO,” Alex tells her, two fingers cool at Lena’s chin and brushing her hair out of the way before placing another disc in the hollow behind each ear. “All I could give her was an MRI. This is a little more… advanced. It should tell us a lot more in real time.”

“Good,” Lena says, giving a little nod as Alex positions a large ring about a foot in front of her face. “That’s… good.”

“I’m going to get a reading first while you’re still wearing the dampener. Then we’ll get one without. Just try to relax and stay still.”

With a slow breath and her eyes fixed at the machine above her, Lena tries to keep her eyes ahead and her body calm while she hears the computer whir and the machine come to life. Unsurprisingly, she feels nothing, just waits while Alex adjusts various settings and controls.

Her curiosity can’t help but get the better of her.

 _“Brain activity looks normal in the frontal lobe. High activation in the parietal lobe and hippocampal regions…"_ Lena lets out a breath, tries to keep her heart from skyrocketing as she hears one of the monitors start to tick up with the increased beat.

_“Sensory information and empathy? I suppose if you view telepathy as an ‘extra sense.’ Occipital lobe looks okay.”_

Alex powers down the machine before the leaves the console to come stand back at Lena’s side. “Alright, I’m going to take the dampener off now. Then we’ll run the scan again and look over the results, okay?”

Swallow thick and heavy in her throat, Lena nods, turning her wrist up and offering it to the agent. With a click, the clasp is undone, the metal opening from her wrist and the sounds of the compound sliding up like the crank of a radio dial.

_“------ make the car payment when I get home, or text Rob to do it.”_

_“It’s not weird to have a thing for a K’hund. Right? Like I just think she’s really neat.”_

_“I’m fucking hungry.”_

_“If I can finish the report on Beijing by four, maybe I can make it home for the game.”_

With the sound of the voices rising and her fists clenched at her sides, the sound of Alex’s voice at her side catches her off guard.

“Lena? You still with me?”

“I--.” Blinking, Lena draws a breath, forces herself to settle on the moment to try and block out the other thoughts. You can do this, Lena. You didn’t pay for eight months of mindfulness therapy for nothing.

_Breathe in-two-three-four._

_“Maybe this is a bad idea.”_

_Out-two-three-four._

_In-two-three-four_. She opens her eyes.

“....Sorry,” she says, forcing herself to keep count of her breaths. “It’s hard to keep focus when it sounds like two dozen people are all talking to you at once. I’m ready.”

Alex watches her while Lena counts another two breaths, and then she nods. “I’ll make it as quick as I can.”

As she starts the scanner again, Lena focuses on the feeling of her breath, the way the cool air slips past the skin of her nostrils. It fills her chest and settles deep in her lungs until her belly rises under her hands. On the outbreath, it’s warmer. The air is moist and heavy with the release of tension as Lena blows it out, her muscles sinking into the bed. She lets them settle one by one, starting at the top of her head and working down to the tips of her toes.

“We’re all done.”

She opens her eyes with her brow furrowed. “Did I fall asleep?”

“I don’t think so, but your brainwaves definitely changed. Come take a look. Here. _It’s fascinating._ ”

Clasping the dampener back around her wrist, Lena hoists herself off the table. She slips her feet into the canvas flats Alex gave her and walks up to the computer console, eyes pouring over the image stills and video cuts spread over the multiple screens.

“What am I looking at?” she asks, even as she’s already parsing through the images.

“With the dampener is on the left, without is on the right,” Alex tells her. “In both, you’ve got higher activity than expected in the posterior cortical and hippocampal regions. Which makes sense. If you’re able to read minds, having increased empathy and a greater access to sensory input seems logical. But where it really gets interesting…”

Pinching her fingers together on one of the images on the right screen, Alex spreads her index finger and thumb, zooming the image before swooping her finger to rotate it to the right angle. Lena tilts her head as she looks at the highlighted structure, comparing the brainwaves at the side of the image to the scan itself.

“When you’re not wearing the dampener, your right parahippocampal gyrus glows like a lighthouse,” Alex says. “I’ll have to refresh myself on the specifics, but I’m pretty sure that guy deals with memory retrieval. Not entirely sure why it’s involved with telepathy, but.... _It must be involved somehow._ ”

Lena stares at the screen, cheek caught between her molars so tight she can taste pennies exploding on her tongue. Swallowing down the rush of saliva that follows the burn, the refrains from telling the agent that she doesn’t need a refresher. Working with Sam taught her enough neurology to that she could probably pick up a degree on the side. She knows asymmetry in the parahippocampal gyrus is related to schizophrenia and the last thing Lena needs now is to start wondering if the voices she can hear in her head are really the psychic thoughts of people that are really there….

Cold dread races up her spine as heat flushes the back of her neck, the apples of her cheeks. She stares at the suspect patch of red highlighting such a deep region of her brain, her most important asset, and she can’t stop the world from narrowing to this moment.

Is this how Lena Luthor loses the last of her control? Does Lex finally take everything from her in the end, anyway? Maybe she’s not swayed to the family madness, but her foundation is shaken out from underneath her all the same.

Where does she stand without the title of genius? What does she contribute without the gifts of her intellect?

Tearing her gaze from the screen, Lena blinks until the afterimage fades from her view, drawing a breath into her lungs before she turns to Alex to ask, “Can I get copies of these on an encrypted flash drive?” She rubs at her a spot above her eyebrow, trying to ease the tension that’s knotting there. “I know we need to go through these as soon as possible, but I’m not sure I can digest this much neuroscience with a concussion and no sleep. Perhaps we can reconvene in the morning?”

 _Lena Luthor wants to put her results on hold? What does she see that I don’t?_ “...Sure. Yeah, of course.”

Lena lets her eyes fall closed when Alex slips away, taking a moment to roll her shoulders and gently crane her neck, trying to ease the building migraine before Alex returns. She’s managed to get her posture most of the way back to its usual straightness when Alex slips back in, inserting a thin black drive into the console before downloading all of the data.

“Encrypting it now,” she said, making a few clicks before she pulls it from the station. “And… there you go.”

“Thank you,” Lena says, curling her fingers around the plastic, unwilling to risk it in even in the pocket of her sweatpants.

“Why don’t I take you home and we can meet back here tomorrow? Let’s say nine unless something comes up? _We both know you’re going to pour over that drive at home and not sleep anyway.”_

“Nine should be fine, I’ll need to check in at L-Corp beforehand anyway,” she says, shifting her weight. “The ride won’t be necessary, I can call a driver.”

“The last thing you need right now is to be around more people you need to hide this from, yeah?”

“I’ve imposed enough, I can manage to get myself home, thank you.”

“Lena, I’m offering.”

She sighs. Her forehead throbs. “...Fine.”

\--------------------

Even if the ride is much quieter than the others she’s taken today, her eyes strain under the constant strobe of yellow and red car lights. With her head back against the seat rest, she lets her eyes drift closed, takes solace in the dark of the evening to hide her tired, resting eyes, and enjoys the moments when Alex’s internal monologue follows along with the low murmur of the radio.

Unfortunately, it isn’t a symmetry that lasts for long. By the time they hit the main highway, she can hear Alex’s thoughts sifting through the events of the day, landing to dwell chiefly on, well, _her_.

_Maybe I should talk to her now. They're both going to be messes about it and it's all my fault ------._

"I can hear you, you know," Lena says quietly, breaking the one-sided silence between them.

"Shit," Alex curses under her breath. "Sorry, I--. Yeah."

"And I'll be fine," she says. "You don't have to worry about me."

"Uh huh, it's little late for that one," Alex replies, glancing at her out of the side of her eye before she turns her gaze back to the road. "Besides. It's my fault she hasn't told you."

"I'd really rather not have that conversation right now."

"Neither would I, but we're going to."

"Great," Lena mutters under her breath, arms crossing in front of her chest as she stares out the tinted window at the dark city streets.

Beside her, she hears Alex take a breath. " _I didn't want to trust-- At first I didn't---_ I spent _years_ telling my sister that she couldn't ever trust anyone with her secret," Alex settles on eventually, the words sitting like little square pegs on top of round holes between them.

"Yet it seems she could trust everyone but me."

"That's the thing, Lena. She didn't. The only person Kara’s ever told by choice is Winn."

Doubt sits bitter as powdered aspirin on Lena's tongue, coating her throat. Alex slows behind a line of cars at the light, eyes boring into Lena’s cheek as she looks at her.

"It was never a matter of trust, Lena," Alex says, prompting a raise of her brow. "Not for Kara. _I_ might not have believed in you at first, but she did. And you have to understand -- from the moment she landed here, we’ve done nothing but tell her how _important_ it is that she never tell anyone about this. Not just for her, but for them, too. Hell, it’s all _I’ve_ told her for the past fifteen years. Because no matter what her biology says, she is too damn soft and caring and you know all too well how many people are willing to exploit that--.”

“I’m not having this conversation right now,” Lena says, shifting in the seat.

“If I take let you leave and we don’t have it, we both know you’re going to avoid Kara for everything you’re worth.”

“Which is entirely my prerogative!” she snaps, words clipped from her tongue. Heavy air sits in the silence between them, the changing of the traffic light from red to green breaking the moment as the car slowly lurches forward.

It gives Lena the moment she needs to collect herself before she throws herself from the vehicle and calls her driver after all.

“I know that Kara is your sister and Supergirl is your agent,” Lena says, a forced calm belying the anger that simmers through her bloodstream. “But my relationship with both of them--with _her_ \--is just that. It’s _mine_. Which means I will take steps to rectify or repair it as I see fit. I don’t appreciate you meddling in my interpersonal affairs and I won’t tolerate it. Is that understood?”

“ _Christ, they’re both going to be difficult…_. Yeah,” Alex says after a pause, turning onto Lena’s street and pulling under the carriage porch to drop her off. “Sorry, just… Trying to help. I’ll see you at nine tomorrow?”

Lena lets herself out of the car, bag full of her clothes, flash drive carefully tucked away with her most precious information on it.

It was going to be a long, long night of data reviews and no Merlot to make it go any easier….

“Yes,” Lena says formally, nodding at the woman she’s sat across from at game night, holiday dinners…. “I’ll meet you there.”

“Call me if you need anything. Bye, Lena.”

“Goodnight, Agent.”

\--------------------

In cold hours of the night, Lena sits hunched over her laptop, head propped on her hand while she stares at the same video clip over and over on repeat.

She’s seen this before, back in her undergrad days: the journey of small, excited spindles across a screen. Tiny spider web strands and forming cells, colliding together to form growth cones and eventually, new neurons.

Neurogenesis.

The process for forming new neurons, new connections en masse in an adult, fully mature human brain.

It shouldn’t be possible. (But neither should telekinesis, or people that can just fly.)

“Oh, Lex...” she says in the silence of her home office, clicking back to the trace of her brain waves, pairing the two clips side by side. “This is why you wanted it. You touched it, too, didn’t you?”


End file.
